mwfriedberg.bsky.social

Yes. And wondering if anybody in the single payer movement is absorbing any lessons here

Friends don't let friends give preregistration a bad name. Exploratory findings are fine; you just have to label them!

Oh yes. And the peculiar failure to cite any of those prior papers

Not a fan of any disease that begins “new world”

Proposition: Hearing the words “best practice” is a near-perfect indicator of terrible decision making.

…but it might work for us

Yes. I don’t think the senders have any appreciation for how much I subliminally hate any politician who allows their name to be used in donation spam. It’s unavoidable even if I like them, rationally. Little by little the spam is hardwiring name-associated revulsion in my reptile brain.

My fealty to the leader who will stop the spam

Concern About Predictive Performance of a Pain Sensitivity Biomarker To the Editor Chowdhury et al1 evaluated a biomarker for pain sensitivity, combining peak alpha frequency and corticomotor excitability. The authors report outstanding performance (validation set area...

Serious concerns about a new cortical biomarker for pain sensitivity

jamanetwork.com/journals/jam...

We (with @tspisak.bsky.social, @christianbuchel.bsky.social) published a commentary on Chowdhury, Bi et al. (2025, JAMA Neurology) raising serious concerns about their reported results.

👇 1/13

An Attack on the Medical Establishment Buried in an 1,800-Page Regulation

Kinda misleading headline, but article covers some very important proposed changes to the role of the RUC and other aspects of RBRVS.
www.nytimes.com/2025/07/21/u...

Ma’am, would you like several fiddly tests whose results about 1% of the medical community can interpret correctly followed by *maybe* a surgery or would you like a once a day pill that will probably sort things?

Yesssss. I cannot describe my satisfaction with this post.

Time for your yearly reminder that “We need less research, better research, and research done for the right reasons”. #OTD 1948 Douglas Altman b (d 3 June 2018) “One of the most influential medical statisticians of the past 50 years” he led reforms in medical research reliability & reporting. 1/3

#ARM25

Like, what does it mean when a Medicaid program increases its spending on primary care? Seems critical to know if provider taxes also increased and what if anything is known about their incidence on PCPs. Ditto equity investments accompanied by tax hikes. Etc.

Mandatory reading for health services researchers: recent BCBSMA Foundation primer on Medicaid provider taxes www.bluecrossmafoundation.org/about-us/new...

This has to be one of the most important aspects of Medicaid policy that almost nobody knows about. Critical to interpreting Medicaid spending

Trade Crime Is Soaring, U.S. Firms Say, as Trump’s Tariffs Incentivize Fraud

Universal issue: if you increase the returns to gaming… www.nytimes.com/2025/05/27/b...

Attention health services researchers: funding opportunity here

Outstanding AI. Honored.

Disgusting. And likely illegal.

In 1989, New York City and its unions temporarily replaced utilization review with sham review for half the participants in the city's health insurance plan. Utilization review had happened before nonemergent hospitalization and ambulatory surgery. Treatment status was blinded. What happened? ...

Funny story but idk. Gatorlode didn’t taste anything like Gatorade.

Here is the video I made, inspired by this wonderful tweet.

www.youtube.com/watch?v=dSOj...

Chief Quality Officer We are recruiting for a motivated Chief Quality Officer to join our team! We are here for life’s journey. Where is your life journey taking you? Being the heartbeat of Denver means our heart reflects ...

Hello friends - Denver Health is actively seeking a qualified candidate for the position of Chief Quality Officer.

denverhealth.wd1.myworkdayjobs.com/DHHA-Main/jo...

I learned a new term today: rollup. When an outside investor consecutively acquires many of the small firms in a local market and consolidates them.

When this occurs with anesthesia practices, prices increase by 18%.

I'm paraphrasing an NBER summary of this paper: www.nber.org/papers/w33217

As usual, there is a methods section at the bottom of the report, including links to all previous years and data versions.

Every health plan and every provider system could publish their own report if they were interested in transparency on this topic.

Now live: Blue Cross Blue Shield of Massachusetts’ 5th annual health equity report www.bluecrossma.org/myblue/equit...

We publish these ~70 metrics every year to be transparent and accountable to our members, accounts, providers, and communities we serve.

HHS announces the next 15 drugs to negotiate under Part D! Great to see this progress. Quite a few cancer treatments, which will mean more savings potential than in the first year's drug list (cancer drugs get limited or no rebates today). Good news for taxpayers and Medicare spending!

New iOS email folder design is interesting. Anybody know if you can train this thing to block all political fundraising emails? Same for text messages. That’s my #1 priority.

Is this like a Jedi moment for economists where you just sense it?